The Edge of Propinquity

Normal version

Digging in the Dirt
An Idolwood story
By
Ivan Ewert
Start at the beginning of the Idolwood series


"Listen, Alex" Edie said, "You go and do what you've got to do. When's the next day you're jogging?"

"Sunday."

"Mmm. Can you swap it with something? Go out to Morgan Glen earlier?"

Grey could see the effort of rearranging the schedule written across his face, juggling dates and times in his mind. "I could go Saturday, around ten. Got clients the whole morning but I could go out until noon or so."

"That'll have to do. Watch very carefully. Go to every entrance and watch the roots and trees. Find any more of these dolls that exist, especially any at the entrances and parking lots, understand? Whoever's placing these has too many eyes for me to be happy, and if we need a place to go the Glen's as good as any other."

"What's wrong with our houses?" Grey chimed in.

"You've had one in your foundations already. Unless you want to check it every night - which isn't a bad idea - we're going to need a plan B to fall back on."

"It'd be easier to place new ones in the woods."

"Yes, probably; but he'd have to make so many more after Alexei smashes them."

"You don't want to see them first?" said Alexei. He shifted his weight, looking suddenly much younger and less sure of himself. "I could get them Sunday and bring them over."

"Lord, no. Smash them the minute you find them. Tear them to pieces, Alexei, understand?"

"Okay," he nodded. "But now ..."

"You've got to go. I know." Edie laid a hand on his forearm again, sending a brief blush up his collar. "Have a good workout. Watch out for yourself."

"Okay." Grey and Edie watched his walk briskly to the Jeep, checking the heart monitor that served as a watch twice in the short distance.

Grey took a deep breath. "Listen. I really don't know about all of this."

"I'm sure. You think it's crazy."

"It's hard not to."

Edie turned, the garden's uplights throwing a shadow against the fence behind her, and motioned to the patio furniture. "Have a seat, Grey. I'm not saying it sounds right to me, either. I'm not surprised you have a hard time with it. It's not rational and it's not sense."

She waved her hand at a patch of white and yellow flowers planted along the decorative path. A string of Chinese lanterns hung alongside, casting the dimmest of lights and wavering shadows to the sides. "Neither is this. I can't afford it. Making a living as a crafter isn't easy."

Grey suddenly found himself relaxing, though he didn't sit. Work was a safe enough topic for a pair of neighbors to talk about in the after-dinner hours. "So why do it?"

"I didn't, for a long time. I worked at the Botanic Garden in Glencoe for five years."

"You were a gardener?"

"A botanist. I kept plant records, watched the health of a few patches. We had volunteers to do the heavy work."

"Why'd you quit?"

"I didn't," she said, "I was laid off."

The words hit him hard. "I'm sorry," said Grey, finding he meant it.

Again she waved her hand, this time in a gesture of dismissal. "It is what it is. I liked the work and God knows it paid better. I'm no dummy, though. Not everything I made went into the plants and dolls, not back then. Kept some savings and I'd been doing the online thing since something like o-five. A nice secondary income at the time. So I decided to make a go of it. Guess what happened?"

"What?"

"Things started making more sense. The way they connected themselves, I mean. I started feeling the house more, feeling the yard. The more time I spent shut up in the house and the yard, the more I understood them. The more I saw.

"I started feeling like certain plants should go in certain places, even knowing, as a scientist, that they didn't belong together. But they bloomed, all right - better and earlier than anything else in the garden."

"You're a scientist?"

"Botany is a science." She shook her head. "So I knew these things shouldn't work, but they did. I knew trying to make a living as a doll maker was ridiculous. I'd never sold more than a few hundred dollar's worth in a month. Then... well, I stopped the cutesy stuff and started adding the extra arms and eyes. Couldn't tell you why. All of a sudden they started selling.

"And the more they sold...the less say I had in how they had to be. Odd numbers. That's how you can tell my dolls from this other's. I won't make them symmetrical. Hell, at this point, I couldn't if I wanted to. Pairs feel wrong. Fours feel off. I can't explain it any better but it's all about odd numbers. It's always odd numbers."

She looked him in the eye, and some of the confidence left her voice. "I can't go into buildings at certain times, Grey. I can't leave, either, unless the time combination is odd."

Her voice sped up; her hands flitted more rapidly as she spoke. It was something she hadn't told many people, if any; and it wasn't anything he really wanted to hear.

"I'm lucky my address is 337, because otherwise I don't think I could live here. Or maybe that was part of it. You see the path? This garden path? There are fifteen lanterns up there. I snipped the sixteenth off and threw it away. Thought about reusing it in the house, since one is an odd number, but..." she spread her hands. "It didn't feel right. Do you know how many pavers are in the path?"

Grey took a breath. He'd followed her until then. "Listen," he said slowly, "I get that you and Alex have something in common."

"We're obsessive?" He could hear the snort in her voice.

"Yes, if you want me to be blunt."

"I know," she said. "That's what powers it.

"Your other doll maker, your spy? He's the same way. I don't know how he's bent. I don't know how he's damaged. But if we find out how he's focused, we can find a way to break him."

Damaged. A good word for both of them, Grey thought. They seemed normal enough when you met them—at least, Alex had—but take a step further into their worlds and that façade started to unravel.

"You do want him gone, don't you?" Her voice was low. "He's trying to get something on you, or Alexei. Or else he was trying to get something on Brody—the last renter."

"Why, though? Why would he target us?"

She shrugged. "You're all single men. Not too many of those in this neighborhood, trust me. That's the only thing in common, far as I can see. You're the only one with a child, Brody was the only one actively dating—far as I know."

His cheeks grew hot. "That's true."

"So maybe he's just a voyeur."

"These were dolls, not telescopes."

Her glare grew hard. "Are you telling me you didn't feel those eyes? Didn't feel the emptiness of them boring into you? Believe me, Grey, there's something about them. I'm willing to bet my eyeteeth that's one of his little gifts, the ability to watch. "

"Ms. Allaway..."

She sighed. "Please. If you've got to test it, go around the front of the house."

Grey stood. "You'd like me to leave?"

"No. Go around the front of the house."

"I don't..."

"You don't believe this works. I'm going to prove you wrong." Her dark eyes bored into his pale ones. "Go around the front. Then do anything at all."

He rolled his eyes, moving to the front of the house and ready to continue on to his car. If Edie Allaway wasn't crazy, she was just a nuisance—and one he could do without. Alex had been more pliant when it was just the two of them, but Edie had more sway over him. He could go home, convince Alex that Edie didn't know anything at all. He kept walking toward the car.

"It's early, Grey," she called from the back garden. "Stay a while."

He stopped. The low, throaty chuckle from the garden came about. "Whatever you like, Grey. Do whatever you like." After a moment, she laughed again. "Can't decide? Three steps to the right, then. Go on. Step to your right, not mine. Not sure you'd know where mine is."

Grey turned, walking back up the driveway. "Changed your mind? Coming back to talk a while? I'm not surprised you don't take orders well, but you'd think in a woman's own yard..."

He quickened his pace to a run and dashed through the garden gates, found her facing the early blossoms of her garden as he'd left her. No wires strung below her feet, no sign of hidden cameras or any other means of watching him. To all appearances she hadn't moved a muscle since he left her side.

"How'd you do that?" He remained standing, watching the nape of her neck as she shrugged.

"Puffing Billy. He's the little dragon up front. There are others, too. I like my privacy and I don't want people dropping by announced."

He recalled the way she'd met them at the porch, not waiting for them to ring the bell. She'd known they were coming and had met them in the driveway. Isaac, too—he never made it to the door, never intended to.

His stomach felt cold.

"All right," he said, "I'm not...married to the idea this can't happen. But the doll Isaac found was in the foundations, not propped up and staring at our door."

"Which direction was it facing? Looking out to the yard or toward the steps, where he could see people coming and going? Where he could tell the difference between your shoes and Isaac's?" She turned to him from her sitting position. "Where he could tell when Isaac might be home... alone?"

Grey sucked in his breath.

"Yes," she said, "that's exactly what I was thinking."

"If there's even a chance of that..."

"You'll work with me and Alex?"

"I brought him here, didn't I?"

"So you'll work with me?"

Grey locked eyes with her. "I think I already am."

"Good. I want you to get back online. Alex has Morgan Glen on Saturday, and I'll do my part around the subdivision. You keep me up to date with anything you find and we'll all talk again Saturday night after Alex has a chance to hit the woods. Make sense?"

"Yes." Grey looked through the fencing. "I ought to go pick Isaac up. He's got school in the morning."

"You do that," she said, turning back to the gardens. "I'll talk to you later, Grey."

#

Battle of the Bulge had been on WGN Friday at midnight, and while Alex loved Telly Savalas' turn as the corrupt Sergeant Guffy, he inevitably drifted off prior to the climactic battle.

He'd woken to paid programming, touting the merits of a workout program he knew would do nothing for the majority of those who signed up for it. More gimmicks, he thought, replacing hard work and focus.

He stripped off the shorts and tank top in which he'd fallen asleep, tossed them into the corner of the basement and walked nude to the main floor. Stopping at the birdcage in the corner, he lifted a threadbare blanket and grinned at the blinking pair of lovebirds.

"Hey, guys," he chirped, "wakey." The newsprint below them would last another day, he decided, and to the shrill sound of their displeasure he turned and moved to the upper-level bedroom.

He stepped into a clean pair of Jockey shorts and exercise pants and pulled a bright red graphic tee-shirt over his head, followed by a fleece pullover. The temperature was still brutal in early spring, and he could strip it off if need be. In the bathroom he ran an electric shaver across his cheeks and chin, whistling tunelessly at his reflection as he mentally ran through the list of morning clients. Nobody difficult today, thank goodness. Mostly good kids who needed a kick in the ass to keep moving at the top of their game.

Coming back to the kitchen, he stuffed two bananas and a half-bag of frozen strawberries into the Cuisinart along with two cups of skim milk and a half-cup of protein powder. The lovebirds shrieked as usual at the high-pitched tone of the blender. He sat and watched the news as he drank his breakfast, waiting for a whole-wheat bagel to finish toasting as Tom Skilling ran through the day's weather. Chilly but clear, he was glad to hear. It would make the trip to Morgan Glen simpler.

The birds got their breakfast and a quick nip at his finger. Hefting the gym bag over one shoulder, he walked into his foyer, leaned across the stairs, and kissed one of many black-and-white portraits of a severe-looking woman. She was foremost in each of the photos.

"Näkemiin, äiti," he muttered, "be home soon. Ms. Allaway says hello."

The morning was easy. He'd sharpened his practice as a personal trainer, taking on only those clients who were serious enough to respect his need for routine and a steady paycheck alike. None of the teens complained about wanting to be elsewhere, and not even the college boys made a fuss about waking early on their precious spring break.

"Good work, Chaz. Thanks for being on time."

"Hey," snorted the last of his boys with a fist-bump, "None of us leaves the Russian waiting."

Alex grinned and turned away. The smile faded at the visage before him. He could have done without Harry today.

"Why do you let 'em call you that?"

Harry was an elderly retiree who worked the floor as a towel boy, sputtering through his false teeth and pin-stitched lips. "You're no Ruuski. Might as well call Antii Niemi a goddamn commie, an' look what he done."

"Won the cup, Harry." Alex stayed polite. Harry was a friend, despite everything; one of the few he'd made.

"Won the Stanley cup, goddamn right. First Finn to ever make it so goddamn far. So why you let these boys call you Russian? Might as well call Stallone a Russian."

"Niemi's no Stallone, Harry. Me neither."

"But you know what I mean."

"They're just kids," shrugged Alex. "They don't know any better."

"School oughtta teach 'em."

"All school's going to teach them is that they don't have to work any more. That's what my dad always said."

"Yeah, well..."

It was an old debate, and Alex paid only half attention as he toweled off his hair and headed to the parking lot.

"Hey!" Harry called. "What the hell are you doing?"

Alex ducked his head and mumbled. "Oh, uh, heading to the woods today."

"No you aren't. It's Saturday."

"Yeah..." He'd been afraid of this. The change of routine had been bothering him since Edie asked him on Thursday, but he couldn't just say no flat out. They'd needed him, Grey and Edie. She'd had given him the choice, and he'd agreed.

"So what the hell? I've never known you miss a Saturday, not the whole year you been coming here."

"Yeah." Alexei shifted the gym bag on his shoulder. "Yeah, I know. I have to go, though. I'll be in tomorrow." He could hear the weights pounding against the floor upstairs, over the hip-hop music blasting through the cardio areas.

Harry shook his head. "Okay, boss. You know what you're doing', I guess."

Alexei's stomach was in knots as he opened the door. Walking to the Jeep he took his cell phone and dialed Grey.

"Good morning, Grey Jordan." Grey's voice was crisp and pleasant, relaxed in the sunny spring morning.

"Hey Grey. It's Alex."

"Oh, give me a minute, please." A short strain of music played before Grey cut back in over the loud percussive sound of someone ascending stairs. "I'm sorry; I had to finish something with Isaac. I thought you might be a recruiter at first. So did you find something?"

"No, I'm not there yet. Listen, Grey. You sure I can't do this tomorrow?"

There was silence, then: "Do you know what Edie does with those dolls and statues in front of her yard?"

"No."

"These dolls are really something serious, Alex. They're watching us, somehow. Maybe there are just miniature cameras hidden in their eyes, but I promise you, they're watching us. I wouldn't be surprised to find out they were watching our houses right now. Edie smashed one; I threw the other in the fireplace. They have to know someone's on to them, and if they don't have anyone else they're watching besides you and me ... you understand?"

"So you think one day's a big deal."

"Alex, I would've liked you to go on Friday morning, after we talked with Edie. You said you had work. Today's as early as you could go. Now if you really can't, for some good reason...well, let's talk; but if it's just a question of changing priorities then I'd appreciate it."

"Why couldn't you go?"

"It's Saturday."

"Yeah, see, that's what..."

"Alex, I've got to take Isaac to his mother's soon. An ex-wife's a serious priority when you're paying child support," Grey's voice lowered and grew harder, "without any income. You're still getting a workout, after all. I'm not asking you too much."

"Okay." Alex nodded and closed the Jeep door. "I guess when you put it that way."

"Thank you, Alex. I'll see you at Edie's tonight."

Alex closed the phone with a sigh. "Still doesn't seem fair."

He shook his head, and drove to Morgan Glen.

#

The first doll Alex found had two heads, each shrunken to half the size of his fist, each withered and wrinkled and missing any true eyes. The hollows he now expected fit the wide crescent of his thumbnails, the gouged wrinkles cut along similar lines.

Its body was little more than a grey sack, bound in barbed wire, set deep back in the crotch of a tree. It was hidden well—if the leaves were in full bloom, he'd have missed it. Idly he considered throwing a stone to knock it from the tree, but instead grasped the branch with both hands.

Wide-grip pull-up, he thought, fifteen reps. He'd make the day work for him one way or the other. Slowly he completed the set, and then hauled himself up one last time to reach for the doll.

The addition of the barbed wire made things trickier - whoever set it here had wrapped the wire around the branch as well as the creation. He leveraged himself up until the branch dug into his armpits and carefully started working the wires loose.

#

"Gamine!" The cry ripped through the house, shattered her sleep.

She grabbed her pistol from the nightstand and bounded naked from the bed, calling, "Where? Where?" She flipped the safety, took the stairs two at a time to the main floor of the building.

"The woods," moaned the Hanged Man, "The Straw Man's in the Glen!"

She stopped short. It wasn't a home invasion. It wasn't a robbery.

It wasn't the police.

"Calm, love, calm," she called down, turning to the bedroom. "I need clothes."

"Bring your gun," he roared, "Your gun!"

Gamine pulled on loose black sweatshirt, black tights. She seized a belt and was buckling it as the Hanged Man entered, unshaven so early in the day, spittle on his chin and madness in his eyes.

"Love. Calm. Love," she whispered, grabbing for her boots. "You found him. We'll find him."

"I promised you this would happen," he hissed, smashing a heavy fist into the ceramic lamp on their desk. It shattered to the ground, sparks and shards. "I knew this would come, and what does she say to me? Calm. Calm! "

His voice rose to a shriek as she dropped to her knees. She thought quickly, keeping the fact that she was buckling the straps of her boots from his sight. He would see only that she knelt for him, that she submitted in this storm of rage.

"My love, be sweet, be sweet to me," she whispered, "I have the gun, my love, you have the eyes, we have the place. The Straw Man will die in a heartbeat."

His breathing remained frantic, but his attention shifted. Throwing open the drawer of his own nightstand he pulled forth an inhaler and a small, floppy doll made of the softest leather. As he took his turn with the inhaler Gamine stood and checked the gun with a quick nod, re-engaging the safety.

While he dressed, whispering to the doll in his left hand, she took up her largest purse and upended it onto the bed. The pistol went in first, along with an extra clip. Two long scarves from the closet which they used in evening games followed, in order to cover the weapon in case of a casual search. She added a cheap paperback romance to weigh the scarves down. Her motions were swift, mechanical, and efficient.

"Calm, love." She stepped forward and laid a hand on his shoulder. "He is yours to undo."

#

The one hidden in the exposed roots of a Japanese maple was the size of his thumb, and he crushed it underfoot before using the roots to hold his feet for sit-ups. Another was in no tree at all, but looped casually beneath a park bench, moist with a dog's urine, making Alex scowl in disgust as he threw it into the tank of the nearby toilets, washing his hands carefully afterward.

He looked now at what he hoped was the last of them with despair. It literally hung by a little noose above the path itself, from a branch so slender it could never bear his weight. The stones he plucked from the path and hurled upward knocked the twisted thing from side to side, but failed to bring it down.

Alex considered. He could shimmy up the tree - it wouldn't be difficult - but what then? He couldn't make it out on that limb, and even if he had the tools to cut through the branch, who could say he'd be left undisturbed long enough to manage? The parks would frown on someone mutilating the trees, even if they accepted his reason for doing it.

"One lousy entrance," he sighed, looking to the sign. Morgan Glen's Oak Opening was the name of the parking area and associated doll. It was the last of the areas he needed to check.

He'd let the others know. The jog back could be easy enough taking the paved parking areas, but he was hungry for a better challenge. The paths through the woods were hillier, made of softer ground that would increase resistance.

He turned back into the green and broke into a quick run, listening to the songs of jays and robins in the air. Spring was coming, his work was finished. Life was good.

#

"Turn, Gamine," said the Hanged Man in a tired voice. "He's gone."

Gamine gripped the wheel tightly. "Damn it."

"He's left but one. Only one of my sweet loves in the deep, sweet green." He made another fist, beat it repeatedly against the dashboard of their town car.

"We do know where he's parked, love." Her hand slid to cover his, but he jerked it away.

"At the entrance, love, he's parked at the god-damned entrance to the entire preserve." He rolled down the window and spat a great twist of mucous to the ground. "The one place we know there will be cameras."

She paused. "If I do well...my love...if I show the Straw Man the error of his ways...what would come in the night?"

He considered her. "Kill him, my love, and what your heart most desires will be ever yours."

A shiver ran down her back. He was mad for her, she was mad for him. "I cannot swear to it, love. I must be ever honest." Her hand shifted now to the purse. "He is quick. And there are many trails."

"If you fail, we are where we are. Make the effort, my love. Be quick and careful and should you succeed..."

"Meet me at the entrance." She swung the town car into a parking space and turned, first kissing his broad unshaven cheek, then taking its excess flesh between her teeth. "If he leaves before me, I will come by the path. If you hear sirens, leave immediately and I will make my own way home. We have no silencer."

He lurched out of the car and stepped into the driver's seat, snatching roughly at Gamine's shoulder. "If he sees you..."

"He'll sooner see a demon." Her eyes fluttered from the hunting ground of the woods to the Hanged Man's eyes, darting back and forth before she leaned in and melted against his corpulent chest for a kiss. One hand slipped into her purse, felt the cold steel as she felt the moist warmth of his tongue entwined with her own, and sent her from her flesh for one rocketing moment.

Tearing away, she flung herself down the path. Anything her heart desired for the death of one straw man.

Not even love would hold her back.

#

Alex lost himself in the sense of his surroundings.

The bloods drumming against his ears melted into the cries of the birds, the far call of geese returning and close song of finches seeking seeds among the underbrush. The sound of his feet slapping against the earth provided the steady counterpoint to those calls, bringing him closer to the world, closer to his flesh, closer to the edge of his world.

This was what he sought. The runner's high, the lifter's ecstasy. He sought the sense of pushing his body to its limits, sculpting it to perfection, in order to bring him entirely beyond its limitations.

He could look down on his body, see the blonde curls shifting in the wind his own motion created, see and feel the sweat pouring down his muscles, the breeze at his back sending a chill down his sweat-soaked shirt.

Detached, he saw the squirrels racing up and down their endless branches. Saw the tiny, drab birds of early spring quarreling. Saw the anorexic woman loping steadily down the path.

Saw the motion of her purse.

He stumbled, scraping one thick hand across the bark of an oak tree and sending birds into the air. Snapped back from the dream, gasping for breath, he straightened and looked behind him.

It had been so real - so certain. Behind him was a thin, tiny woman with milk-white hair and murder in her eyes. She'd been as real as the birds which flew about him.

Something cold closed around his chest.

Alex turned and ran.

#

She felt the wind in her face and in her teeth, bared against the forest.

She felt the heavy weight at her side - not in a holster, but a purse, disguising her intent.

She heard no birdsong, watched no rodents at play in the trees.

She smelled him, it seemed, up ahead. Taking to his heels. Terrified.

She caught her tongue in her teeth and felt the wind in her face.

#

He threw himself off the path. It wasn't safe. It would never be safe. They'd watch for you, wait for you. He focused on the trees, the brambles beneath his cross-trainers.

The entrance, the Jeep. That way, he thought in a flash and darted forth, leaping over fallen trees and logs. When the path was well behind him he briefly thought to check the heart rate monitor. His heart was pounding, and there was a global positioning system built into the machine.

He was still high from the exertion.

He didn't need a machine.

The Jeep was northwest.

Alex ran.

#

This was where he'd left the path.

She'd doubled back on herself, lost in the joy, lost in the hunt. It wasn't enough to run, to race down the straight track. Gamine had blood in her nose for the first time in years, true blood; not mere surveillance and reporting. She was on his trail and he would pay for what he'd done. He would face her, and he would not suffer. He wouldn't have to.

He would die first, and that was fine by her.

Her tongue was caught between her teeth in a bizarrely petulant gesture as she raced down the hillside. Off the path, she reached into the purse.

No need to hide things now.

Out came the pistol.

#

The two of them ran with equal purpose, hunter, prey; both moving on pure instinct. The monitor, the gun, both were mere toys in the hands of twin magicians whose paths had finally crossed.

Leaves which had not mulched over the winter cracked and snapped beneath their feet. Alex heard her, he was sure of it, heard the steps behind him but he did not turn. Gamine knew she saw him, snatches and flashes of the garish red t-shirt darting from corner to corner, tree to tree.

Alex tasted metal. Gamine tasted blood. He ran pumping both arms, chest heaving like a white-hit forge. She ran with one arm thrust behind her, keeping the pistol from snagging on some out-thrust branch.

The world was gone for both. They danced through Morgan Glen without thought, without sight. They felt the rhythm of their blood and the cool wind on their skin.

He was surprised to feel himself grinning.

#

Alex crashed through the trees and nearly stumbled into a pair of teenagers seated on the hatchback of their car.

"Dude!" The boy shouted, but Alex grabbed his arm and pulled him down behind the car.

"Gun," he shouted, "She's got a gun, get down, both of you!" He seized the young girl and pulled her down beside the boy. "Get under the car! Call 911!"

The girl shrieked and rolled under the Toyota as her boyfriend fumbled for his phone. Alex turned to scan the rest of the lot, saw a man seated in an idling Lincoln town car, and waved frantically, screaming, "Gunman! She has a gun! Go! Go!"

The Hanged Man's eyes narrowed. He quickly gunned the engine and the car leapt forward.

Alex dodged behind the Toyota with seconds to spare. The town car clipped the rear bumper, just where he had been standing moments before. It raced down the parking lot and sped out onto the street, neatly cutting off a blue minivan which threw its brakes on at the last second.

"Yeah, a gun! Morgan Glen! What?" The boy's voice shook. "Uh, I don't know..."

"Pike Lake!" Alexei shouted. "Tell them Pike Lake entrance! Get under the car, now! NOW!"

The boy scrambled under the car as Alexei grabbed for the hatchback, threw open the hidden panel and seized a jack from the floor. It was nothing against a gun, but as long as the children were there, he couldn't go for the Jeep.

They needed him.

#

He'd made it.

Gamine's eyes filled with tears of frustration. She brought the gun around and aimed—he was visible through the trees—his blonde locks curled around the ear she had in her crosshairs, tempted her, and filled her mouth with the taste of thwarted desire.

Witnesses meant police.

She snapped the gun down and thrust it into her purse, turned and ran to the south. The preserve opened out onto the highway, where she could walk a few blocks to a convenience store or Starbuck's. She would melt into the crowd, go unnoticed, slide between the perception of the world, and go unnoticed and unseen and unheard.

Her life, unnoticed. Unimportant.

Meaningless.

Gamine choked back her screams and took to her heels.
 

Story by Ivan Ewert, Copyright 2011
Image by Amber Clark, Stopped Motion Photography, Copyright 2011

Last updated on 5/15/2011 9:49:38 PM by Jennifer Brozek
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Go to Idolwood 2011.

Other documents at this level:
     01 - Foundations
     02 - Fetishes
     03 - Craft
     04 - Little Dolls
     06 - Breathless
     07 - Abductions and Reflections
     08 - Fasces
     09 - The Wild Hunt
     10 - The Wild Hunt Part Two
     11 - Birth, Breath, Life, Death
     12 - Silent Nights